The world's second oldest school has asked several year groups to learn from home for three days.

King's School in Rochester has announced a pupil and a teacher have tested positive for Covid-19.

To help cope with reduced staff numbers and to stop the spread of the virus, it told its Year 7, 8, lower and upper fifth, lower and upper sixth and Remove (Years 9) pupils to stay home from today until Thursday.

In a message to parents, head teacher Ben Charles said: "The number of cases in the Medway region has risen sharply over the last few weeks and this has contributed to a heavily increased number of staff absences due to self-isolation, often initiated through the NHS track and trace app.

"This is in addition to the usual absences through illness that this time of year brings.

"The health, safety and wellbeing of our pupils, staff, families and the community are at the forefront of the decisions we make at King's.

"Following a discussion with the chair of governors, we have made the decision to carry out a precautionary partial closure for the next three days.

"We do this with great regret; however, staff will continue to teach our academic lessons remotely.

"This enables the school to perform a thorough deep clean and ventilation of the classrooms and social areas for these year groups, as well as carry out our robust contact tracing procedures to identify 'close contacts' of the affected teacher and pupil.

"Nursery, reception and year groups one to six are not affected by this partial closure, and I am reassured that children in these groups can return safely."

The school dates back to 604AD.

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